In 1709 (or was it 1710?) the Statute of Anne created the first purpose-built copyright law. This blog, founded just 300 short and unextended years later, is dedicated to all things copyright, warts and all. To contact the 1709 Blog, email Eleonora at eleonorarosati[at]gmail.com

Thursday, 17 May 2012

Copyright Tribunal's final decision in Meltwater now available

As readers of this
Blog will remember, last February the Copyright Tribunal published its interim decision in the
fascinating case of Meltwater Holding v The Newspaper Licensing Agency(see 1709
Blog's coveragehereand here).

Controversy arose out of
a new pair of licences promoted by NLA in 2010, called the Web Database Licence
("WDL”) and Web End Users Licence (“WEUL”). The WDL/WEUL relate to the
particular type of media monitoring activity carried out by Meltwater.

The NLA contended
that the nature of Meltwater’s business meant that both it and its customers
needed to take out WDL and WEUL agreements. Meltwater’s position was that
it was prepared to enter into the WDL and undertook to do so, but that its
customers did not have to enter into the WEUL at all. This was because
Meltwater’s customers, by receiving the Meltwater service, did not commit
any of the acts restricted by copyright and therefore did not need a licence. As
clarified by the Tribunal in its interim decision,

Surely there is more expectation about the Supreme Court's Meltwater ruling than the release of The Dark Knight Rises ... Definitely.

In a nutshell Meltwater’s point was that the material sent to
customers was too insubstantial to be a copyright work or to be a
substantial part of the original news article. Copying the material would
not infringe (if there was no licence) and so copying the material was not
a restricted act.

The findings of the Tribunal were however that

end users of a headline only service should enter into
the WEUL just like end users of the normal Meltwater News service of
headlines plus extracts and should be subject to the same tariff rates.

This said, the
Tribunal agreed with Meltwater and the PRCA's contention that the NLA's
proposed licensing scheme was not reasonable and required amendment.

As reported
by journalism.co.uk, since the interim decision of the Copyright Tribunal, the parties have
worked together in close consultation to reach an agreement on the finer details of the licensing payment model, with a revised
fixed price agreed upon.

Now,
the Tribunal has accepted the terms proposed by the parties as
"reasonable".

Some copyright enthusiasts are already camping outside the Supreme Court, waiting for the start of the Meltwater's hearings

Compared to the first licensing scheme, the agreement now includes - inter alia - reduced rates for the very smallest users (low number of
employees) and, in parallel to this, increased rates for the users with high numbers of
employees.

Co-founder of
the Meltwater Group Jens-Petter Glittenberg explained that the NLA and
Meltwater are now committed to ensuring that UK end users of such monitoring
services are licensed quickly, fairly and efficiently.

So far so good -- but fans of
this saga will have to keep holding their breath for a year or so. Meltwater
and PRCA appealed aspects of the Court of Appeal's decision on web browsing to the
Supreme Court (see here). Release of the sequel is expected in early 2013.

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